Nazis, Russians, and Martians

I've been ranting about music a bit these past few posts, so I've decided to get back to ripping apart something that I love more, i.e. video games. My floor tends to bond a lot with First Person Shooters (FPS to those of you who don't have a degree in Kill/Death Ratios). We'll stay up late playing TeamFortress 2 or Borderlands, or some other time sink. We like these ridiculous games. I know for me, it's there style. This update is devoted to a FPS trend that annoys me.

Why are we always killing Nazis or Russians?

I never really got into Modern Warfare or Battlefield: Bad Company. These games strive for realism and, in my opinion, sacrifice lots of potential to do it. Many FPSes (FPSi?) revolve around one of two ideas. Either the Nazis are still causing trouble, as in most World War 2 games and Wolfenstein, or the Russians have invaded or attacked America, like in Modern Warefare 2. Both of these entities are super powers that have had massive impact on the world, and both of them have been in two many games. Did you know that the Metal of Honor series has been going on since 1999? It's literally been in production longer than the actual WW2.

I understand the idea that fighting Nazis and Russians are great for war games. How else could you make a WW2 game without Nazis? See, my problem with FPSes now is that they all try to be war fantasies. Everyone seems to have this dream about being the hero of the war, personally ending Hitler's reign and ending the war. What I want to know is how uncreative are these game studios? There are only some many times we can go through the battle of Normandy, or drop in on D-Day. After a while it gets really dull.

One of my favorite FPSes is the Serious Sam series. Serious Sam is one of those mob shooters that spawns waves of enemies and lets you deal with them what whichever of the hundred guns you're allowed to carry at one time. In SS you get to shoot headless kamakazes, scorpion men with Gatling guns, and three story molten lava monsters that split into smaller versions. These games are ridiculous on so many levels, and that's what makes them fun. TeamFortress 2 is by far my favorite FPS, and with good reason. IT has charm and style that you don't see in most modern games. When I compare TF2 to Modern Warefare, I am amazed at how much faster and engaging the game play in TF2 is.

Realism, I believe, tacks away from the potential of games. No matter how good it looks, how indepth your gun mechanics are, how real the game seems, if the developer doesn't capitalize on its potential, then it can fail. Why is it that companies restrict themselves to war games that try to be real. I would love to see someone take the mechanics of Modern Warefare and put it into a game about a time-traveling Kight from King Arthur who shoots Aliens on some planet in the depths of space, with guns that shoot diamond peacocks. As long as the story and the mechanics fit together well, I believe that great games can be made from obscure ideas.

Essentially, however, FPSes are just point and click adventures. You point your gun, click, and move of in your adventure.

Just something to chew on.